B2 Distinguishing Living, Natural Non-living and Human Made Things

Part 1 Collecting Critters and Things Activity: Children collect a range of critters and things. Critters which includes every kind shape and size of living organism; plant , animal, insect, worm etc. domestic or wild; and Things refer to every thing that is not living, natural things such as rocks, water, air and all human made things as well. Part 2 Beginning to Classify Things Activity: Dont start with a lot of explanation. Have the children divide their findings between the following categories; a. Living or biological things: E.g. pets, wildlife (pictures will do), dead things like shells, bark pinecones, bone, feather etc. Introduce BIOLOGICAL as any critter that is currently, or was living or was part of something once living. b. Natural, non-living things: Non-biological things that are not man-made. E.g. rocks, stones, dirt, air, water. Questions: What non-living things did we leave out of our collection? What would the world be like without water/air? Would we/plants/anything be able to live? c. Human-made things: E.g. metals, plastics, paper, ceramics, rubber etc. as well as things made from wood and other biological items. Relate findings to SLG when appropriate. Common Misconceptions with the above activity. Are Plants living? What are the attributes of living things? How do we distinguish living/biological things from natural non-living things, such as stones?

Have children recall experience of seeing plants grow etc. Plants grow and reproduce 2 PRIMARY aspects of Living things, lead them to the 2 major groups of Living things being ANIMALS and PLANTS. (Subsequent activity could involve 2 boxes dividing plant and animals). Where should very simple human made things go? e.g. Wooden Block. Emphasise we make nothing from nothing. To make anything we must start with some materials. Introduce RAW MATERIALS (RM) or RESOURCES (the starting materials for making things). Every raw material (without exception) comes from either, Biological or non-Living/Natural category. Q&A : Allow children to ponder resources that may not come from either category any they propose will be false. Wood/Paper- Trees, Plastics Crude Oil or natural gas derived from ancient life on Earth, Metals Mineral Ores. Human Input on RM can be substantial or Minimal. Have children demonstrate differentiation by saying RM for the wooden block was a tree, but it was cut and shaped by humans, so I will put it in the Human-made things. Introduce CONSERVATION, emphasising ALL resources are limited in quantity and cost money therefore we should use only as much as we need. DO NOT WASTE MATERIALS and EXERCISE CONSERVATION.

Where should food stuffs go? Processed food will be difficult to grasp however ALL foodstuffs should go into the Biological category. We cannot make food from plastics! Table Salt is a mineral and thus the one exception. Part 3 How we make separations Children will make intuitive judgements when separating biological, natural and human-made things. Bring out the factors on which these judgements are based. They dont necessarily observe the factors we know living things to possess (MRGREEN). Four aspects that distinguish Living/Biological things. 1. Distinct Orientation: Head end, tail end, top side, bottom side, right-side up, upside-down. Contrast this with a stone. 2. Symmetry: Living things have pronounced symmetry bilateral (right mirror image of left) or radial (circular patterns e.g. starfish, pinecone). Orientation and Symmetry together provide a form and shape unique to living things. Take water, clay and air in contrast which unless imposed by humans (then human-made) 3. Fine Structure and Detail: Close examination reveals abundance fine structure and detail, almost always in even and repeating pattern. E.g Leaf veins, ridges clamshell, feather segments, fish scales, earthworm segments, mushroom gills etc. Activity: Use a Magnifying glass. Hold to eye bring item close to glass. In Conclusion, out intuitive recognition of living things is based on seeing ORIENTATION, SYMMETRY, AND FINE STRUCTURE. 4. Tenuous Quality: i.e. Prone to die. Need to maintain certain conditions, but even so will go through a life cycle of ageing and death. Life is only maintained through a cycle of reproduction and growth. Aspects of Human-Made things Human-made things frequently have symmetry and orientation, but lack attributes of living things. Bottle caps dont have babies or die! Made for a specific purpose. Often made from paper, metal or plastic that dont occur in nature except as litter. May require fuel or power to run, and may break but this is conspicuously different from the needs of living things.

Natural Non-Living things Distinguish them through their absence of those features. Naturally occurring in their existence by nature apart from human activities.